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Aunt Abby's Chicken Pie

A savory pie made with whole chickens, salt pork, optional butter crackers, and a pastry crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,417 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Aunt Abby's Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Stew the chickens

  1. Join the chickens.

  2. Stew them in barely enough water to cover for 30 minutes.

  3. Remove the chickens from the broth.

Assemble and cover the pie

  1. Place them in a deep dish.

  2. Layer the chicken with slices of salt pork and optional butter crackers.

  3. Season the broth well.

  4. Pour the broth over the chicken.

  5. Prepare a top crust.

  6. Wet the edge of the dish slightly.

  7. Place the crust on top, sealing it well.

  8. Decorate with pastry.

  9. Add a layer of cooked potatoes at the bottom of the dish.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Chicken + porktop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,417 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Pork + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Chicken + potatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,756 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-decenal (green, must).

  4. Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chickens
Provide the main meat, and their juices enrich the broth that moistens the filling.
Sweet salt pork
Adds fat and savoury flavour as it melts into the chicken and broth.
Pastry
Forms a top crust that seals in the broth and browns as it bakes.

The step that matters

Place the crust on top, sealing it well.. A tight seal traps steam and broth inside the dish, keeping the filling moist. A loose edge lets liquid escape and can leave the chicken drier.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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